Published on Mar 31, 2017ESA astronaut Paolo Nespoli from Italy will soon embark upon a long-duration mission to the International Space Station. Scheduled as part of a barter agreement between NASA and the Italian Space Agency ASI, it will be his third flight to the Space Station; his first flight was in 2007, during the Station’s construction phase, followed by a six-month mission launched in December 2010.

Paolo is currently training at the European Astronaut Centre in Cologne, Germany, in preparation for the many scientific experiments he’ll be carrying out in orbit.

During today's Soyuz undocking/deorbit/landing coverage, the NASA PAO noted that Yurchikhin will be the Commander of Expedition 52. Peggy Whitson will be a Flight Engineer on Expedition 52, after she serves as Commander for Expedition 51.

The reins of command of the International Space Station were passed from NASA’s Peggy Whitson to Fyodor Yurchikhin of the Russian Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos) during a ceremony on the orbital outpost June 1. Although Whitson is remaining on the station as an Expedition 52 crew member, Yurchikhin will serve as Expedition 52 commander until he, Whitson and NASA’s Jack Fischer return home in early September. Oleg Novitskiy of Roscosmos and Thomas Pesquet of the European Space Agency will return to Earth as a two-man crew on June 2 in a Russian Soyuz spacecraft, completing a six and a half month mission.